Simmered Japanese Pumpkin
- Kurumi Hayter
- Apr 4, 2021
- 2 min read
Updated: Dec 12, 2025
Hello everyone. I still have a few pumpkins growing in the garden and one leftover in the larder, so I thought I'd make another traditional Japanese pumpkin dish - simmered pumpkin (kaboucha no ni-mono in Japanese).
This is a quick side dish that's tasty and nutricious. Enough said! I pair this with a bowl of rice and a soup (you can find everything you need in the Recipes section of the site) and hey presto! You've got a healthy, low calorie Japanese lunch or supper sorted.
If you've seen this recipe elsewhere, you'll notice that other cooks leave some of the pumpkin skin on the flesh - you can do this too if you like but personally, I like my pumpkin fully skinned.
The key to the simmered Japanese pumpkin dish is to let the pumpkin simmer until there is almost no liquid left and the pumpkin has soaked up as much juicy flavour as it can so that the flesh is just beginning to crumble a little. You can find the written recipe and video link below.
If you'd like to see another tasty way to use kaboucha, then why not take a look at my miso soup with pumpkin recipe (photo on the right) that I posted last week. You can find the recipe by clicking Miso soup with Kabocha and Green Beans.
Happy cooking! Kurumi XXXX.
ingredients
300g deseeded & skinned japanese pumpkin (kabocha)
110ml japanese dashi stock
1 tbsp soy sauce
1 tbsp honey
how to:
cut the pumpkin into bite size chunks
add the stock, soy sauce and honey into a pan and bring to the boil
simmer over a medium heat for about 10 minus, stirring occasionally
your simmered pumpkin is now ready to serve